What (cheap) video cards to steer clear of?

Llama · 2012-10-29 10:32:29

Hi,

I've got an onboard Intel video card which isn't really good.

Suppose I decide to buy something cheap, and I don't care to waste another $30, say. What kind of keywords I should steer clear of? I've got good impression of my old Nvidia 6800 onboard chip, but it's gone. Some research shows that Nvidia can be a problem, to.

The world of video cards is huge, and they are usually good. But not always. I hope my question is put reasonably. What are the most known problems, in keywords?

bohoomil · 2012-10-29 10:53:06

This one, for instance (a bit above your price range, though).

Last edited by bohoomil (2012-10-29 10:54:20)

Šaran · 2012-10-29 10:55:05

I have Nvidia 8600 (2007) on desktop and 460m (2010) on laptop. I have never had any problems with drivers or anything else.
Old PC can't play 720p without GPU acceleration, but with VDPAU it doesn't have any problems even with 1080p.
Only lack of KMS could be a problem if you spend a lot of time out of X.

Llama · 2012-11-17 10:56:47

So the idea of collecting some info on the bad ones didn't turn out to be popular . Meanwhile, I bought this:

$ lspci -v -s `lspci | awk '/VGA/{print $1}'`
01:00.0 VGA compatible controller: NVIDIA Corporation GT218 [GeForce 210] (rev a2) (prog-if 00 [VGA controller])
Subsystem: ASUSTeK Computer Inc. Device 83e8
Flags: bus master, fast devsel, latency 0, IRQ 16
Memory at fa000000 (32-bit, non-prefetchable) [size=16M]
Memory at c0000000 (64-bit, prefetchable) [size=256M]
Memory at d0000000 (64-bit, prefetchable) [size=32M]
I/O ports at e000 [size=128]
[virtual] Expansion ROM at fb000000 [disabled] [size=512K]
Capabilities: <access denied>
Kernel driver in use: nvidia

It's probably OK, though the fonts look just a shade different. As a movie player it's quite good.

Last edited by Llama (2012-11-17 11:23:47)

hunterthomson · 2012-11-19 07:47:17

If you want to use proprietary drivers, which I guess you do if you want good grapics, Go nvidia

If you want a good card but you want to use the Open Source drivers, Go ATI

However, the Open Source nvidia driver is fairly good now too, so really... just go nvidia. It will be good whatever you choose.

Last edited by hunterthomson (2012-11-19 07:49:16)

Arch Linux

#1 2012-10-29 10:32:29

What (cheap) video cards to steer clear of?

#2 2012-10-29 10:53:06

Re: What (cheap) video cards to steer clear of?

#3 2012-10-29 10:55:05

Re: What (cheap) video cards to steer clear of?

#4 2012-11-17 10:56:47

Re: What (cheap) video cards to steer clear of?

#5 2012-11-19 07:47:17

Re: What (cheap) video cards to steer clear of?

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